


Brave

by ElectricBoomerang



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Caleb is a werewolf and this is the hill i will die on, Gen, no beta readers we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-18 19:02:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13687857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElectricBoomerang/pseuds/ElectricBoomerang
Summary: There was a wolf in Nott's forest.Or: Caleb makes a friend. Nott steals something.





	Brave

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first time trying to write these two, so they might be OoC, but I love them and their dynamic so much and my brain would not let me Rest until i spit this out in like an hour.

There was a wolf in Nott’s forest. She covered her ears with her hands, to keep out the sound of its baying at the base of the tree she’d perched herself in to escape it.

  
She heard leaves crunch under its claws as it eventually lost interest in her and began to trot off. Slowly, she let herself relax, preparing to dismount from the tree, She stiffened, hearing the wolf cry out- in pain? It was from not too far off.

  
She considered her options for a long moment. Stay in the tree- probably for the rest of the night- or go investigate, running the risk of getting injured, or worse. Her thoughts were interrupted by the wolf whining as loud as it possibly could.

  
Nott sighed, and began navigating her way out of the tree. It wasn’t hard to find the wolf after that, just following the sounds of it crying out.

  
When she found it, it was even scarier than she had thought it would be. In the light of the full moon, she could see the dried blood around its muzzle and streaked in its fur. Around its hind legs were manacles connected to broken chains. Its left front leg, on the other hand, was caught in a trap some human must have left before. It stiffened, cutting off another sound as it noticed her. A snarl built up at the back of its throat, eyes narrowed. Gods, its eyes. Its eyes were intelligent. Calculating.

  
“I’m- I’m here to help,” she stammered, staring at its sharp teeth.

  
It bared its teeth at her for a moment, and then paused, as if considering her question. That- that wasn’t normal for wolves.

  
( _Nothing about this was normal._ )

  
Finally, it sat down on its haunches, ears perked. She could see that it was using all of its willpower to not flinch at the pain shooting up its leg. Hesitantly, she approached, and pressed down on the plates on either side of the trap, freeing its foot.

  
There was one, terrifying moment where the wolf was free, and she was completely at its mercy. She shivered, quickly backing away. Slowly, the wolf rose to its feet, holding the injured leg to its chest.

  
It walked carefully out of the forest, its uncharacteristic intelligence seemingly returned to it from the experience. It threw one last look at her over its shoulder, cocking its head ever-so-slightly, before making its way out of sight.

  
That was the last she saw of the wolf.

  
For that night, at least.

 

The next morning, there was a human in Nott’s forest. His clothes were ragged and torn, dirt and… mud- she wanted to say- streaked across his face. He walked with his left arm carefully cradled against his chest. She could see bandages from between the tears in his coat sleeve. A tabby cat strutted behind the man, head held high as if the cat owned the place.

  
The man paused, and Nott realized that he was staring down at the trap that the wolf had been caught in the night before. The cat sniffed at it, tail lashing, and the man made a sound at the back of his throat.  
Curious, Nott analyzed. Was he looking for something? The wolf?

  
Desperately, she wanted to ask, but. She- she knew better than that.

  
Nott sighed, and prepared to walk away. She’d spend the day in a different part of the forest to avoid the man. But on her way out, her foot hit a patch of leaves, making a loud _crunch_ that sounded even louder in the silence of the woods.

  
The man stiffened, his head swinging around to look at her. “Is- is someone there?” he said.

  
_No,_ she wanted to say. She settled for dashing behind the nearest tree trunk, hoping the tree’s shadows as the sun rose would manage to hide her.

  
She heard a quiet _whoosh_ , and there was a spark of light behind her. She could hear the sound of the man’s boots on the grass as he approached. _This is it, Nott. Had a good run,_ she thought in a panic. Her heart beat like a little hummingbird against her chest, and sweat dripped down her neck.

  
Finally, the man rounded the tree, and Nott could see that there was a ball of light hovering above his hand, illuminating both their faces. “Hello?” he asked quietly, lowering himself into a crouch so he was on eye-level with her.

  
Nott’s breath hitched in her throat as she took a sharp step backwards, but she didn’t run. He didn’t seem to want to hurt her, at least. “Y- yes?” she stammered.

  
“Are you the one who helped me last night?” As he said that, he furrowed his brow just a little bit. Concern? Confusion? Humans were very expressive, Nott realized. So expressive that she couldn’t quite piece together what he was thinking. Too many signals. Jamming her radar.

  
“I think… I think you might have someone else,” and then she paused, before quickly adding in a “sir,” at the end. _That was a human honorific, right?_

  
“I mean, were you the one that helped a wolf last night? It was caught in that trap over there?” he corrected, hesitantly.

  
“No- no, sir. No wolves here!” Nott said a little too quickly.

  
He made another sound. Disappointed. “Thank you. I apologize for bothering you,” he said, and stood up, extinguishing the ball of light. He made his way out of the shadow of the tree, and then Nott-

  
Nott did something very stupid. “No, wait- that _wasalieimsorry_!” he confessed, her words coming out in a nearly incoherent rush. “There was that weird wolf last night that got caught in a trap last night, and I helped it get out, and it left! Why do you need to know? Are you trying to find it? How do you even know about the wolf?”

  
He stiffened, and turned back towards her. He smiled gently, and tilted his head _ever-so-slightly_ , a perfect mirror of the wolf the night before.

  
Huh.

  
“I’m not looking for the wolf,” he said, slowly. Hesitantly. Nott wondered how long it’d been since he talked to anyone. “I wanted to say- thank you.”

  
“Thank… you?” she repeated. “Why did you say _thank you_? You’re not… you’re not… oh my god…” she trailed off. “ _You were the wolf?_ ”

  
He took a deep, shaking breath. “Yes.”

  
“Humans can turn into wolves?” And more quietly, she added, “The elders never told me about that.”

  
“Not all humans. Werewolves. Every full moon, I turn into a wolf. I usually try to chain myself to a tree or a fence post, but…” he said. “Last night, I managed to escape- _evidently_.”  
“And you got caught in the trap?”

  
“Yes. And you helped me, and I just wanted to thank you for that. That was very brave.”

  
“Brave?” she mimicked. No one had ever called her brave before. _Coward. Thief. Liar,_ she’d heard. _Deserter._

  
But never _brave_. Nott simply wasn’t brave.

  
He smiled. “ _Very_. I’m Caleb Widogast.”

  
Nott thought for a moment. She wasn’t brave, but Mama was, the elders had always said. Same as her mother before her, and that mother’s mother, too. Brave had never been how they described Nott. But she’d always been a thief. She would take their word, and drape it over her like a stolen cloak. “I’m Nott. Nott the Brave. And… could you- could you teach me how to do that light thing?” Mama couldn’t make light appear out of thin air. She wanted to be better than Mama, and the elders, and Mama’s Mama, and Mama’s Mama’s Mama, too.

  
Caleb beamed down at her. “Of course.”


End file.
